Using The Blade and Mind
by GoodBooksAndGoodTea
Summary: The races of Alfheim Online are in a power struggle. The latest update allows time travel, which Oberon shows only to power hungry players. The first target? Sylph leader Phenaran. They go to Connor's 8th grade year to do their work, and the powerful Spriggans must send Adanrienn to protect their pawn's leader. (More detailed summary in 1st chapter)
1. Information

** THIS FIRST CHAPTER IS JUST INFORMATION ON THIS AU. YOU CAN READ TO UNDERSTAND HOW THE STORY'S ALFHEIM WORKS INSTEAD OF THE ANIME'S. THE RACES ARE DIFFERENT, AND ETC. GO TO NEXT CHAPTER FOR STORY IF YOU RATHER SKIP.**

I totally changed how all of the fairy races work… I'm so sorry… Spriggan is just my favorite! First though, here are all of the races. I have the official information (O) and alternate universe information. (AU) Official information is from the SAO Wikia or the anime.

**Spriggan****-**

O- From the Ancient Runes Area of the Northeast. Their color is black. They are masters of illusion magic and are great at treasure seeking.

AU- The Spriggans are the Master Race, (not including the World Tree, not completed yet) and are most noted to have real life scientists, mathematicians, and programmers/technology experts working. They prefer to control other races and the battlefield, so they are a secretive and manipulative race. This serves them well, though. Instead of the normal governing system, Spriggans have three main leaders. (look below to Political System for more) Then they have different classes of the Army unlike other races. Most of them have used their expert illusion and light magic for different purposes than intended. (In the anime, Leafa says Spriggans don't have the best choice in mastered magic)

**Sylph-**

O- From the Grassland area of the Southwest. Their color is green. They are known as the fastest race and excel at wind magic.

AU- The Sylphs are, at the moment, one of the Spriggan's main pawns. Their leader, Phenaran, or Connor in real life, is the way the Spriggans are controlling the Sylph. The Sylphs believe the Spriggans can help them become a stronger race.

**Salamander****-**

O- From the Desert area of the South. Their color is red. They are known to be strong in attack power and are masters of fire magic.

AU- The Salamanders are still the bad guys, but not completely, in a way. They are against the Sylphs, because of Alfheim's power struggle. The Salamanders are so far stronger than the Sylphs, but because of the Spriggan and Sylph's alliance the Sylphs could easily over power them. The Salamanders will do just about anything to make sure they stay as strong as possible.

**Undine-**

O-From the Wetland area of the East. Their color is blue. They great and water and healing magic.

AU- The Undine are working for the Salamanders, actually. Since the Undine rather not fight back, they assist the Salamanders. The Salamanders who watch the Undine aren't the best, though. The Spriggans are still controlling part of the Undine because of this.

**Cait Sith****-**

O-Live to the west of the World Tree. They are noticed by their cat ears and tails. They are great beast tamers with the best eyesight and a high speed.

AU- The Cait Sith have stayed out of the power struggle as much as possible, trying to just power up without having much contact with the others. Their power with animals caught the Spriggan's 1st Leader Ruith's eye. The Spriggans are pondering the idea of using the Cait Sith's tamers.

**Gnome-**

O- From the Frost Areas of the North. Their color is brown. They are the largest of races and are great at earth magic.

AU- The Gnomes' commanders have given up on the World Tree. The Gnomes are confused and angry at their leader's decisions and are therefore having an in-race war. Only the Leprechauns and sometimes Pookas are affected by this sometimes since they are the only races in the North.

**Imp-**

O-From the Alphine Areas of the Southeast. Their color is purple. They have great night vision and therefore are masters of the night.

AU- The Imps have always had a long-term contract with the Spriggans. Illusion magic and nighttime goes well together, right? The Spriggans, treating the Imps as pawns as usual, mainly tossed them to the side as soon as they became a more dominant race. The Imps are very mad at this and want to take revenge but don't like Salamanders since they light up the night, taking away the Imp's advantages.

**Leprechaun****-**

O- From the Frost Areas of the North. They are a blacksmithing race and have mechanical wings.

AU- The Leprechauns are neutral. They haven't fought any wars except for the game's main quest of conquering the World Tree. They sometimes help the Spriggans, but in return help other races with the same generosity. At the Race Council Meeting of 2023, all the races agreed that the Leprechauns would stay neutral and no one would ever use them against other races. This has stayed true since the meeting. (check below at the Political System/Matters for more)

**Pooka****-**

O- From the Northwest. Specialize in music combat to confuse and attack.

AU- The Pooka work with the Salamanders sometimes but keep to themselves a bit more. They are a lower race (according the power chart in the Political Matters section below) and they just feel like pawns to the Salamanders. The Salamanders find their music combat useful, and rather have a stronger alliance but the Pookas won't agree.

**Political System**

In Alfheim, there is one main government structure. There is the Leader. The Leader is the ultimate ruler of the whole race, and there is one leader per race. This excludes Spriggans. All races have a commander, and depending on the race you can have one or multiple co-commanders. Along with race rulers, there is the Race Council. The Race Council is made up of all the race's leaders and meet once a year or at times of distress. (In the anime, when the World Tree was conquered, that would have been a distress meeting for example) The Race Council simply exists to make sure races have what they want, not including things like power. (For example, the Leprechauns wanted to be neutral and got that) Then there is Alfheim's ultimate ruler, King Oberon. (No one has seen or met him though)

**Spriggan's Political System-** Unlike most races, the Spriggans have three leaders. They have three departments, in a way: science, technology, and math. They value these in the same order. The 1st Leader, the scientist, is Ruith. The 2nd Leader, the computer programmer, is Adanrienn. The 3rd leader, the mathematician, is Taruken. They also have their commanders, of course, and each section has a commander, three co-commanders, and warriors.

**Political Matters**

Obviously, every race wants to be the most powerful. At the moment, the Spriggans are the most powerful. This list changes a lot, so to keep it as simple as possible if you want, think of this list as the power list. The top four or so are the only changes you need to pay attention to.

Power List:

Spriggan

Salamander

Cait Sith

Sylph (These is the lowest you need to pay attention to)

Undine

Imp

Pooka

Leprechaun

Gnome

**Detailed Summary:**

The races of Alfheim Online are in a power struggle. It's 2026 and the latest full-dive technology is time travel through the system. It's only available in Alfheim Online, and Oberon only let the players hungry for power know of it. He watches them use time travel to try and obliterate their enemies. The first person to go is Phenaran, leader of the Sylphs- but instead of murdering the adult in real life, the Salamanaders decide to go back to when Phenaran- also known as Connor- was a young 8th grader. The Sylphs are the Spriggan's main pawn for power right now, so they send their second leader, Adanrienn, back to Phenaran's 8th grade year. She must blend in with them, look like a normal 8th grade English honors student, and keep her being a fairy a secret. This proves to be harder than Adanrienn thought, and she's getting impatient- she's been stuck in America in 2015 for two months so far having to pretend she was a student and the Salamander's spy/murderer hasn't struck yet.


	2. 1- The Meeting

**Actual first chapter… sorry, but since it's an AU I decided it would be best to explain how ALO works in this version. Hope you like it, SAO is one of my favorite animes! (I liked all the arcs, SAO and GGO being my favorites) **

**DISCLAIMER- Don't own SAO one bit. Just own a copy of the novels. (Or any other company mentioned in this chapter) **

_Link start._

Haley had heard those words plenty of times, and liked the way it rolled off her tongue. She was 24 years old, but already was one of Japan's best female programmers. She moved to Japan for college, wanting to program games, or really anything. She had moved from Colorado, in the United States. Growing up, she loved gaming, technology, and her studies. She had grown up being an honors student always, and doing things like robotics instead of cheerleading or fashion. She also played violin, but wasn't the best. Instead of practicing, she would be trying to finish the latest Legend of Zelda game. When she did play, she liked playing movie themes, like Lord of the Rings music, instead of the monotonous scales her director gave her.

After she had finished college, she was able to work on an Indie game. It was a pretty big hit for an Indie, and she was instantly asked to do more. After a few successful and just some games hit her resume, she worked to try and join RCT. Her favorite type of game was MMORPGS. She got into them because when she was 11 (officially old enough to play some T-rated games in her mother's opinion) she got to try out a classic MMORPG. She loved it. All her life, in class, Haley had only a friend or two. Most people thought she was just too quiet to want a friend. It was true though, Haley was more of an introvert. She could be very social and pull it off if she had to, though. In the game, though, Haley played as Adanrienn- an elf who was an influence to Rivendell and the War for the Rings. That became her official gamer name. (pronounced Adan-rin) She felt important and needed. That's what pulled her to work on a VRMMORPG, the Japanese version of Gun Gale Online. After a year of working just on GGO, Haley decided to take up the offer RCT had given her.

_You've played a bit of Alfheim Online. You have done a great job on Gun Gale Online and we would like you to work on ALO. You can still play as a character. You can work on ALO and GGO or just focus on ALO If you accept. Also, since you know English, now that you have mainly finished your job in GGO of translating it you might be forced off. We hope you take this offer._

Haley accepted and for seven months had been an important player and had worked on ALO after she had stopped working on Gun Gale Online. Since she was a big programmer, she easily worked her way up in the ranks of her race- Spriggan. She liked their secretive ways and their different political system. Just a month ago, the original second leader had given up his spot and asked Adanrienn to fill it. She happily accepted.

As soon as she finished saying _start_, her brain was instantly focused on what was ahead. _Another Spriggan-Sylph Alliance Meeting. _It was quite odd in her opinion since the last meeting was only last week. The Spriggan Leaders had decided the Sylphs were currently their most important power pawn, and had to give them what they wanted. Some problem had come up apparently, because Haley received a message from Phenaran (Sylph Leader) requesting a meeting.

Bright sunshine hit her face, along with its warmth. The wind blew her knee-length night black hair off her back. She was in Neutral Territory, and the Alliance Meeting was in ten minutes. She quickly flew to the spot, where Ruith, Taruken, and her many guards met her. "Hello. Sorry I'm so late. Had a business phone call," She said.

"It's all right, Ada. There is still five minutes until the official meeting begins, although we'll probably start early seeing as we are all here." Taruken said, observing the surroundings.

Phenaran walked up in a Sylph-green robe. "Hello, Spriggan leaders. Ruith, Adanrienn, Taruken. I'm sorry for requesting another meeting so soon."

"Why did you request our time? We have many matters to work on right now instead of this," Ruith said, his Spriggan-like serious attitude coming on.

"It's about the 7.0 update."

As soon as Phenaran said that, the Spriggans were quiet. "_The update? Darn it! I know Taruken thought of some possibilities for why Phenaran requested the meeting, but the update was the one situation Ruith and I couldn't come up with an intellectual answer for! Either way, it's the update, so it has to be about the new spell you can use. Why would only the leaders receive the message about the item anyway… might as well put it in the Update Section, right…?" _

Taruken thought of some possibilities for why Phenaran had requested the meeting. Ruith and Adanrienn thought of how to answer Phenaran if he asked them. Taruken showed them the last reason he came up with- the update. Updates were every once in a while. Along with minor bug fixes, updates always added at least one more thing. Sometimes they were quests, or in this case, a game-changing new item or spell. This time, it was just bug fixes and some new quests, so most of the Spriggans and other fairies were pretty lackadaisical on it. The three leaders received a private message from Oberon, the fairy king who no one had ever seen or heard from, saying another new thing in the update, the game changer, was a time travel item. Naturally, the three instantly discussed it, and asked their Commanders about it. Taruken stopped Adanrienn and Ruith from asking anyone though because apparently their top commander hadn't heard anything about the item. No one seemed to talk about it, so the three concluded only leaders must have received it. "Umm, well, as I was saying, the update… I received a message. From _King Oberon. _I was hoping you could educate me on this more, since you are Spriggans and all…" Phenaran prompted.

"So very sorry. Have you asked any normal Sylphs, by chance?" Ruith replied, shaking his head to relieve himself of the short thought trance.

"Actually, I haven't, nor have I asked my commanders. Why, have you?"

"We asked our top Commander. He didn't understand. We took the precautions and didn't tell anyone else and were hoping you hadn't either, simply."

"Well, Spriggans are supposed to be smart. So, think it's actually possible?" Phenaran was obviously feeling like this was a prank, for he was talking as if the update was a rotten fruit and was lightly tightening his lips feeling as if he were wasting time.

The three didn't respond. In their heads, they did a quick deductive process to think of the best reply in the shortest amount of time. Adanrienn came up with a reply first. "You'd think if it were real, all of RCT would know, but I was never notified and I'm one of the company's top programmers. Either it's fake, or Oberon did it himself just for a few players. I can't think of many better reasons,"

"Well, I say we experiment. The new item is a level 90 item, so only us leaders can use it. The message said the item would simply be given to us if we performed a certain spell. I say we try it." Ruith was a scientist, so the first thing to do for him was experiment.

"Aye, that's right, I don't know if I'll be very good at time travel though. Besides, I'm level 88. I could not use it anyway." Taruken said. "What do you think, Phenaran?"

"Well, I say experiment to your heart's content. If it works out, we can use it, right? We can use it against the Salamanders," Phenaran replied at lightning speed.

"I suppose. They'll use it against us, too, probably. I bet they received the message, at least the leader." Adanrienn attempted to bring Phenaran to his senses.

"Oh, good point."

Ruith simply slid his middle and pointer finger down in front of him, the familiar move bringing up the main character screen. "It is nine thirty. I have business to attend to and must make an opening for this new experimentation. Good day, Phenaran." Ruith simply bowed his head lightly and left.

Taruken left after giving Phenaran his famous nervous, nerdy goodbye wave and sprinting after Ruith saying something about the latest math about wing time and how he had to be careful. "Well, farewell." Adanrienn gave an elegant turn and wave as she flew off with the guards to Spriggan Territory while Phenaran left to Sylph land.

The meeting was over, and Adanrienn decided to log off early instead of discussing the latest topic more. _Rather just debate it tomorrow, I'm tired._ She said her common emotionless farewell to whoever was around and logged off.

Haley's eyes opened. She slid off her Amusphere, put it on her desk, and changed into comfier pants and a shirt. Hopping into bed, she let herself drift to sleep thinking one thing.

_What will the experiment be?_

**Sorry. These first few chapters are more about introducing the plotline and why it's happening. I personally think it's more thought out and more interesting to read the chapters about Adanrienn in 2015. I just want to start posting those but first another chapter or two about the experiments…**


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